


somehow the same

by mrs_nerimon



Category: Haven - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Identity Issues, majorly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-26
Updated: 2014-10-26
Packaged: 2018-02-22 15:47:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2513171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrs_nerimon/pseuds/mrs_nerimon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She says she’s just Audrey Parker now, but she knows she can’t really be Audrey Parker without being them, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	somehow the same

**Author's Note:**

> Do I even write for other fandoms at this point?
> 
> Basically I'm still kind of confused with how to think of Mara/Audrey/Sarah/Lucy/etc right now. I'm sure the show will explain some of it before the season's out, but here's my take on it. Based on what we got in season 3, I've always viewed the personalities as primarily the same person. Given what's happened in the last episode, I'm not so sure what to think any more.
> 
> Contains spoilers for 5.07, but is set sometime in the future. During their bi-annual five minutes of happiness.

It’s a whole new experience now. He doesn’t shiver when she touches him like he used to, he doesn’t hold her as close to him as possible, pressing against as much of her skin as he can.

She misses it, a bit. It was nice to know she was the only one who made him _feel_ , the only one who could relieve his trouble, if only for a little while.

She’s glad it’s not _just_ that, though. Touch was important to him but knowing it’s not the only thing, knowing that he can still love her without it, is comforting.

They still have sex, although sometimes she wonders if it’s any different for him now. She thinks it must be, but Nathan would never bring that up in a million years, and she doesn’t want to embarrass him. He doesn’t seem to enjoy it any less, which makes her feel some inane sense of pride.

She still likes spending their nights laying together and just _talking_ ; they missed out on so many discussions over the course of their relationship, they seem to be catching up on it all now.

They talk about cases and whatever Duke’s doing and how Haven’s little league team is faring. They talk about _them_ and Audrey tries so hard to make up for all the times they pushed each other away. 

One night she asks Nathan to tell her about Sarah; all of it, even the stuff that makes him blush and shake his head.

She wants to know who she was, what she wanted, how she and Nathan found each other.

He denies her at first, saying it didn’t _mean_ anything, but that somehow makes it worse. It needs to mean something, it needs to mean that he can recognize her no matter what. Needs to mean that he _loves_ her no matter what.

And maybe it wasn’t that for him, maybe it was a mistake or a slip-up, but she doesn’t want to believe that. She wants to hold onto the romanticized version, where he loves the parts of her she doesn’t even know about.

“I don’t remember it all.” He says, but she can see through that.

“Please, Nathan.” She’s not above begging; this is her past and she feels entitled to it. It’s a memory of _them_ that she doesn’t have and she wants it, needs to keep it inside of her.

He sighs and draws her in closer so she can rest her head on his chest, rubs his hand up and down her back.

“Okay.” Nathan seems to think the whole thing over. She can’t see his face but she imagines he’s got that sort of hard look in his eyes, the way he does when he dwells on something. “You want to know everything?”

 _Everything_ , she thinks. All of it, all of who she was. Is. Could have been.

Nathan’s chest rumbles when he talks, and there are moments where she almost let’s it almost lull her to sleep. But she forces herself to pay close attention, to ask questions when he seems to trail off.

He starts off with what he already knows; Sarah was a nurse, she came to Haven with Stuart Moseley. It was her first day in Haven, Nathan says, which means it must have been her first day out of the barn.

Sarah couldn’t have know anything, then. Not about herself, not truly about Haven.

They met at the hospital. Nathan’s voice changes when he mentions meeting her, although Audrey can’t quite tell why.

“She was beautiful.” He says, and her heart feels a sudden pang. It can’t be jealousy, she tells herself, because you can’t be jealous of things that happened to _you_ , right?

He tells her Sarah agreed to meet him later and Audrey can feel the anxious twist in her stomach, already caught up in his tale. She knows how it ends but the journey is still enticing somehow.

As he continues, she tries to close her eyes and picture the scene. She can see him clearly; wide-eyed, awkward and yet somehow sure of himself at the same time. Sarah is harder, because she just keeps imagining herself sitting there with him on the beach, holding his hand and being terribly forward.

She can’t quite see herself sleeping with Nathan the first day they met, although she knows it must have been different for Sarah. Maybe if he had looked at her back then the way he does now, with love and adoration written all over his face, maybe she wouldn’t have been able to help herself.

When he gets to them actually sleeping together she wants to laugh at how he describes himself; eager and apprehensive, wanting but conflicted. And Sarah seems so open, so willing. So unburdened.

For a moment, Audrey thinks she herself will never feel like that again.

Nathan begins rubbing at her back again, almost unconsciously as he continues. His fingers slide over her stomach while he tells her how Sarah dragged him up the beach laughing, kissed him over and over.

A new type of thrill runs through her, making her curl up closer into him.

The car sounds cramped and uncomfortable as he describes it, but she guesses that wasn’t really a factor in the moment. Sarah certainly didn’t seem to mind, the way he talks about it, and she lets her eyes fall closed again as she thinks of it. This she has a clear picture of, having a first row seat to the Sarah’s memory of it anyway, back in the barn.

“She was so…” Nathan breaks off, fingers stilling against her skin. She wants to raise her head and look at him but then he barrels forward again, skipping from the beach to back at the hospital, and sending him and Duke back.

Audrey knows Sarah was brave (“You’re always brave.” Nathan makes a point of saying, which flushes her with a feeling of pride once more), but she can’t imagine how so. When she thinks of what she must have gone through; losing Nathan, someone she felt _connected_ to, and then having to lose her baby too.

Sarah feels like the most tragic of them all, in a way.

Nathan finishes by clearing his throat, raising his hand up to prop behind his head.

“That’s all.” He murmurs, taking a deep breath.

She raises up onto her elbows, so she can look down at him clearly. He gives her a small smile as he reaches up to cup her cheek.

“She was so like you. I mean, some things were different-“ He tugs lightly on a blonde strand, his eyes drifting across her face. “But I felt the same with her. Like I do with you. Whole, again. And… Happy.”

She swoops down to kiss him, hands settling on either side of his face. They come together quickly, almost harshly, but there’s a want so strong inside of her all of a sudden. He’s shared this with her and she wants to give him something in return.

It’s fast but _good_ enough, and after she remains straddling him, hands splayed across his chest.

He’s the first to break the silence.

“How do you feel about them?” He asks, and she immediately knows what he’s referring to. _Them_ makes it sound like she’s got some disorder, but perhaps that’s closer to the truth than she’d like to admit. 

“They’re all parts of me. I think.” She sighs as she offers what little answer she can. In truth she doesn’t know how this works, doesn’t have a _clue_ how to feel about her past lives or her former selves or whatever the hell they’re called.

Mara is distinct, another person taking over her body, forcing her to the sidelines. Yet Lucy and Sarah and all the others who came before feel closer to her. She says she’s _just Audrey Parker now_ , but she knows she can’t really be Audrey Parker without being them, too.

Surely she’d give any therapist a run for his money, at this point.

Nathan brings a hand up to rest on her waist. It’s remarkable how often he still touches her, given that he can no longer feel her. Maybe it’s simply muscle memory, or maybe he knows how comforting it is to be reminded that she’s not alone in this.

“Parts of you?” He echoes, questioning but not denying.

Audrey wishes she had a better answer, a _real_ answer for whatever the hell has happened to her. 

She thinks maybe they others are a piece of Mara now, but she doesn’t like that idea. Mara doesn’t deserve them; Sarah or Lucy or even Lexie, any of the _Haven savers_. They belong with her, as pieces of who she was. She can choose to be Audrey now but she shouldn’t abandon them, not entirely.

“I wish I knew more about them.” She says suddenly. She slides off of his waist and kneels beside him, settling back on her heels. If she remembered them, maybe that would make them more _real_ , more her.

Nathan makes a noncommittal noise.

“It would help.” She continues, thinking back on who she already knows she’s been. He’s blissfully filled in one of the many blanks, but so much is still uncertain. “I want to know what they’ve done.”

He raises his eyebrows but doesn’t refute her. He understands her curiosity, her drive to understand herself, of all people.

“So tell me about them.” His voice sounds somewhat ragged, like he’s too tired for this, but his attention is raptly focused on her.  

Audrey tips her head to the side, considering what he’s offering. A chance to get it all out there; all of who she used to be. Then she can just be _her_ , finally. 

“Okay.” Her response comes in a whisper, drifting out between the two of them. Sarah’s been put to rest for now, she thinks, so she moves onto the next one.

Neither of them know anything much about Lucy, and the people who did are long gone from Haven. She thinks she might be able to get it out of Vince and Dave, but she no longer trusts the Teagues any further than she can throw them. 

So Audrey lays back down beside him, rests her head on his chest and makes up a story. _Lucy_ , she decides, was a reporter. She worked for the Herald, and she didn’t take any of the Teagues’ shit. She was strong and willful and a little cold, maybe. But she loved James the minute she met him, like she just couldn’t help it. They didn’t have much time together but she loved him just the same, loved all the little moments they were able to share.

Nathan strokes her hair and hums in agreement when she pauses, and his silent support is more than enough.

She does know that Lucy tried to run away and escape Haven, but somehow the Guard found her anyway. She doesn’t want to think about that, because there’s the same fear that still drums through her. That she’s not safe here, these people want her dead and gone.

Lucy’s story had a sad ending too. She saved her son but it cost her her life, the freedom she so desperately tried to achieve.

When she finally trails off Nathan presses a kiss to her head, and she remembers he has a claim to James too. A connection, maybe, but one that never got to grow.

James is a conversation they’re never broached. She guesses it’s because they both feel so unprepared, but sooner or later it must come out.

Tonight is not that night, however. It’s enough to discuss _her_ , she can save their time-traveling, possibly dead son for tomorrow.

“And then you came.” Nathan fills the dead space, his words mumbled as his face is still turned into her hair.

Yes, then there was _Audrey_. Audrey Parker the FBI agent, the foster kid, the one who refused to make connections and friends because life was easier to operate when people didn’t let you down.

“Audrey was a bit of an idiot, sometimes.” She teases, and he chuckles into the top of her head.

“Never.” Nathan swears, so she kisses the side of his chest.

“I got to do a lot. As Audrey.” She takes in a deep breath. There was a time where she thought Haven was just another stop in her career, another town where she would spend a few weeks and then ditch out. It’s almost hard to remember that feeling, though, because it seems by now that Haven’s a part of her too.

He nods slowly, his arm settling around her waist again. After a moment he looks down at her, still resting on his chest.

“Is that all of them? The ones you know about, I mean.”

There are presumably dozens that she’ll never know the names of, but _no_ , that’s not all.

“You’re forgetting.” She pokes at his chest, still surprised when he doesn’t react. 

Nathan frowns, so she raises her head and smirks at him.

“Sexy Lexie.”

His eyes drift closed and he nods minutely, fixing his expression before he looks out at her again. She knows he disliked her being Lexie, understands at least on some level _why_ , but she can’t deny that she spent however long in the barn thinking she was a southwestern bartender. 

Lexie seems different from the others, but not entirely. She’s someone Audrey could be, she just might need a few drinks first.

Nathan lets his fingers travel up to her nose and he gives it a teasing tug, making her laugh.

“I think you would have liked real Lexie.” She says, trying to remember what it was like when she truly thought that was who she was. “I know I acted… Different, to push you away and all, but really we were kind of similar.”

His eyebrows quirk up, but he remains silent.

“I think she wanted to help people too, she just didn’t know how.”

Maybe Sarah and Audrey had it easier. They came with jobs that lent them to playing the hero. Lucy stumbled into it, and who knows, maybe Lexie would have found her way too.

“I think I would have liked her too.” He confesses, and the relief floods her instantly. “I think I would have liked all of you.”

_I don’t care who you are, or what you are._

_I love you_.

It’s no less wonderful to hear him say it now, _especially_ now, after all the business with Mara.

Audrey leans forward and kisses him softly. When they break apart she rests her head back on his chest and closes her eyes.

He doesn’t pull her into him like he used to, the way he wanted every part of her touching him. This may seem unfamiliar now, like a new starting point, and that’s okay. Because they’re still _them_ and they’re still moving forward.

And now she’s really and truly _her_. Audrey Parker. That’s new and unfamiliar too, but she still has him. He’s her constant, the one thing she never fears will willingly desert her.

Nathan’s hands resume their movement on her back once more. This time she lets it relax her, guiding her gently into sleep.


End file.
